Have you tried to do intermittent fasting and fasted cardio?
Iam a pretty solid guy, but i felt i was too heavy when i started doing martial arts again after several years break. When i started i had used the last 2 years to train strongman and focus on getting as big and strong as possible (iam 186 cm and at my biggest i was 120+ kg). I looked best when i was 118 kg (still with some fat for sure, but you could still see some abs).
Then when i started at Kyokushin karate, i felt so slow and heavy i started doing fasted cardio and intermittent fasting. Just stop eating at 20.00 evening until around 10.00. I did my training and cardio in the morning, drinking only water till 10.00 and the kgs flew off me. I lost some of my top strenght for sure, but now im at 110 kg and i feel fast, explosive and my joints feel a lot better. It took me like 6-8 weeks of losing the fat, but i still ate the same food, just in a more narrow window of time and doing the cardio fasted.
I can't say this would work for anybody, but the fasted cardio worked for me, i lost my bellyfat so fast i could almost see a daily change.